Site Turned Down For Nuclear Waste Storage

April 25, 1992|By PAUL MARKS; Courant Staff Writer

In an action they conceded soon will be moot, directors of the Connecticut Hazardous Waste Management Service Friday accepted a consultant's finding that radioactive waste cannot be stored safely on a prospective site in South Windsor.

After the four directors present at a meeting in Hartford voted unanimously to remove the land from consideration, board Chairman Domenic Forcella said that the site-selection process almost certainly will begin anew next week. He said Gov. Lowell P. Weicker Jr. will sign legislation that orders the waste service to add three new criteria to its evaluation of suitable sites.

FOR THE RECORD - Legislation regarding a low-level radioactive waste dump - expected to be signed soon by Gov. Lowell P. eicker Jr. - requires the Connecticut Hazardous aste Management Service to submit a new plan for site selection to the General Assembly by Feb. 1, 1993. A story on Page B4 Saturday incorrectly said the agency had to make the site selections by that time.

The legislation requires the waste service to arrive at new site selections by next February. Members of the board of directors said that between now and then public hearings on how to choose a site will be held around Connecticut.

Board member Richard H. Heller told about a dozen activists and town officials, who attended Friday's meeting at the state Capitol, that their input will be heard.

"The time to [comment] is when we're setting criteria, not after the criteria have been set," he said. "It's been one of the disappointments of the board that we had hearings two years ago and advertised them" and only a few people attended.

By comparison, angry crowds numbering in the hundreds turned out to protest the site choices after they were announced June 10.

Those present Friday, including leaders of the citizen groups Citizens Opposed to a Radioactive Environment and Connecticut Opposed to Waste, promised to participate in the new round of hearings.

Core Chairman Paul Catino said the unsuitability of the South Windsor land "is absolute proof of a fundamentally flawed

methodology" having been used in arriving at the finalist sites in Ellington, East Windsor and South Windsor. "Any thoughts of using any parts of that methodology in the next process should be abandoned immediately," he told the board.

However, board member Barbara H. McWhirter noted that many of the selection criteria -- such factors as underlying geology, proximity to rivers and lakes and drinking water sources -- will not change. "The exclusionary criteria are not going to change because they came from state and federal law," she said.

Friday's vote hinged on the determination by Envirotech, a consultant hired by the service, that too many wetlands lie on about 180 acres in South Windsor for low-level radioactive waste to be stored safely there. Soils scientist Jeffrey Peterson made his inspection April 10 at the invitation of South Windsor officials.

No inspection was made of two prospective dump sites in Ellington or of the East Windsor half of the South Windsor site, although a soils scientist hired by the three towns last fall found similar flaws on those sites.

McWhirter said the Envirotech findings convinced her that the U.S. Geological Service maps used by the waste service to identify wetland areas were either unreliable or not detailed enough.

Catino agreed. "They have to improve their data source, and that's something that's going to be a recurring theme for the next 10 months." He said more detailed wetlands information could be obtained from town planners and from the state Department of Environmental Protection